


à temps

by jeanjosten



Category: All For The Game - Nora Sakavic
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Alternate Universe - Coffee Shops & Cafés, Angst, Car Accidents, Coma, Death, Eating Disorders, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Implied/Referenced Alcohol Abuse/Alcoholism, Insomnia, M/M, Mild Sexual Content, Panic Attacks, Soulmates, Strangers to Lovers, Supernatural Elements, probably medically inaccurate
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-04-22
Updated: 2018-04-23
Packaged: 2019-04-26 13:36:55
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 4
Words: 15,361
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14403246
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/jeanjosten/pseuds/jeanjosten
Summary: Jean Moreau hasn't had a good night of sleep in years now. This is because of the things he sees, the things he senses--everything he knows and cannot pretend to ignore anymore, all he has ruined and cannot fix. He's spent his life running: not from anyone, but in search of something or, rather, of someone. And up till now, he's never found them in time.But then he bumps into Neil Josten, a mysterious and damaged waiter he feels inexplicably attracted to, and when he realizes this might be the first time he is ahead of his dreams, he remembers they always end the same way.





	1. Maybe Tomorrow

**Author's Note:**

  * For [alaseux](https://archiveofourown.org/users/alaseux/gifts).



> For Zoe @jeaneils, because she does her best to get me through hard times and make me believe in myself. You are the Nathaniel to my Jean. 
> 
> Just some jeaneil therapy to cure what's wrong. Very angsty. I don't know the end yet. Listen to [Ocean Bloom by Radiohead/Hans Zimmer](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Hv8kSWyIKsM).
> 
> You can find me on [Tumblr](https://wesninskids.tumblr.com/).

Sometimes it doesn’t take much to make a tragedy.

One moment he’s a child, gathering dreams and hopes and souvenirs for another life, the next he’s sitting there, on that corner booth, staring at his coffee like he might see the world’s answers in it. But there’s nothing to see, and time passes by, and when he pinches the bridge of his nose a quiet voice startles him.

“Nice suit,” someone says, and when he looks up it’s the café’s waiter. He doesn’t think he’s seen him before, and there’s no recognition in the young boy’s eyes, but they’re meek and tired like they crave closing. Jean wonders how many times a day he forces himself to spark up a conversation.

The waiter tilts the carafe and Jean shakes his head. “No, thanks.”

“Work?” he asks, though Jean isn’t sure why. This isn’t a conversation at this point, and he doesn’t look hopeful enough for tips. He blames it on the boredom, because there are only two booths currently occupied by customers, and about two others that need to be cleaned. Anything sounds better than that, he figures.

“Social event,” is all Jean bothers to say.

The waiter nods and stands there awkwardly for a moment, perhaps hesitating to ask if he needs anything.

“How come you wound up alone after a social event?” The innuendo is pretty clear, and though Jean’s cheekbones slightly go pink, he doesn’t meet the waiter’s gaze.

“My family left before me,” Jean lies. It feels as easy as breathing, and almost as natural, and he lingers on the thought for a second. He should have felt guilty, but he feels nothing.

He leaves eventually, and Jean pretends a newfound interest in the salt cellar. When he knows he won’t meet anyone’s eyes by looking up, he searches for the boy again, and observes from afar like any shady, lonely client might.

He’s young, he can tell—a few years behind—and he looks like he doesn’t quite belong here. With his aggressively red curls and his unsettling blue eyes, his tan skin and his dark freckles, Jean decides this is a boy for sunny days. What he’s doing here, in this rainy busy city, he isn’t sure. He’s not going to ask.

Jean stays there for a solid hour before deciding his coffee is too cold to be drunk. The waiter drops by once again, but he shakes his head before he can even ask. He pulls a bill out of his pocket and slides off the booth, dragging his feet to the exit as the waiter stares.

 

It’s the edge of the night when he comes back a day later. The sun’s already out by now, and shops and headlights light up the city in a whole other way. Jean finds it pretty for a moment, before remembering why he’s there—then he wonders why he hasn’t left yet and the same bitterness scorches his throat. Some things shouldn’t have answers.

He doesn’t smile to the staff as he finds an easy way to the empty booth he had occupied last time. The café is slightly more crowded tonight, and he takes his time observing each and every customer, wondering if that’s what writers do. He wishes he had that creative streak, wishes he could sketch people from a distance, or perhaps absorb their emotions to build something pretty. Anything—a poem, a song, a book even, and then he remembers people like him spend their entire life searching for something they are good at. Sadly, he reckons he doesn’t have any talent, and though he cannot call himself banal, he does feel like it.

It’s a strange thing to feel in such a lively place, and as the upbeat indie music lulls in the background, he wonders if he’s too old for this now. He’s only twenty-seven, yes, but somehow, it feels as though he has lived too many lives. The wisdom this false seniority involves is absent, however, and he feels hollow with need and confusion.

“Nice to see you again,” someone chimes by his shoulder, and he looks up to find the redhead waiter.

He’s not entirely surprised to find him there, so he gives a glimpse of a polite smile and half a nod.

“What can I do for you?” he asks, and Jean’s lips part in a quiet prayer. For a glorious second, he lists all the things he could demand. Few sound reasonable, and none feasible.

Peace. Truth. A little bit of warmth, if he dares push it. “A coffee,” he settles for. And that’s exactly what the waiter comes back with. He stares at the freckles on the tip of his nose as he leans in to drop the cup, and then looks away in embarrassment. He knows the boy didn’t notice anything, but it still feels like stealing a piece of something that doesn’t belong to him, and he wonders if people have ever given it back.

He thinks, probably not.

Then the waiter slides a piece of cake onto the table and Jean stares at the blueberries showing through in far-off puzzlement. “I didn’t order that.”

“I know,” the waiter says. This is all he says—but he smiles, lightly, and it feels like a secret.

Jean nods. When the waiter leaves, he fixes a tired gaze on the cake and swallows dry. He hasn’t eaten much today, nor has he yesterday. This plate doesn’t feel like this is something he is going to empty, and he feels guilty for a second, knowing that boy only meant well. He grabs the spoon when he feels the waiter’s gaze on him from behind the counter, but the cake feels tasteless in his throat. It looks good, he knows, warm and colorful and sweet—but he has lost his appetite long ago, and isn’t sure he will ever find it again.

He doesn’t want the redhead to think he didn’t appreciate the gift, so he takes another spoonful and eases back into the booth. What’s he doing here? He’s not sure anymore. He’s never quite been.

Soon he’s going to have to be somewhere else, he knows. He can feel it.

“Fuck it,” he whispers as he rubs his temple, and pulls his cellphone out of his jacket to check the time. He can’t seem to remember what day it is.

He opens the Notes app and scrolls down the endless names, all very fresh in his memory, all so heavy at this time of the day. Jean knows he won’t be getting any sleep. By the time he reaches the bottom the boy is back, and he doesn’t bother look up right away. When he does, green patches flicker as he blinks, and he feels a rush of heat going through his body.

He wonders if he’s going to faint.

Wonders if he’s awake to begin with.

“Did your family leave you behind again?” the voice asks, and it’s nonchalant, but curious, and light with something he thinks might be recognition.

Jean presses his lips tight as a bitter reminder. “I guess so.” He walks around his own truth, shapes it like it deserves to be. He might not be that creative, but at least, he’s never been out of lies. “I’m always a little late anyway.” For once, he’s telling the truth.

“If they couldn’t wait for you, then you’re better off alone,” the boy says. If this was so easy, Jean thinks, but doesn’t say. There’s no pity in his eyes and he doesn’t force a smile, instead picking up the plate Jean has left full.

“Sorry,” Jean presses before the boy can disappear.

The waiter smiles, and it wavers with uncertainty and surprise. “About what?”

He points at the plate he’s holding in his right hand, balancing two others in his left one. The waiter’s face softens as he understands, and if he wasn’t holding it all, he might have shrugged.

“I understand. Today’s not a good day. Maybe tomorrow,” he smiles, and it feels so genuine Jean can’t help but stare. He tries to remember the last time he’s smiled the same way, but comes up empty-handed. He can almost hear it on the edge of the boy’s lips: _come back tomorrow and you’ll get the dessert special_ , and he imagines a quick conversation in which he’d question the waiter about his job, and how legal this free offering thing is supposed to be.

None of it happen, none of it is said, and by the time the boy comes back the cup is empty and Jean is gone.

 

The third day, he knows is the day he is going to leave. Nightmares are coming back, cutting hours off his nights, making his fingers tremble as they fight to hold onto reality. Every minute he spends in this nameless city is a minute he is wasting, and he can only ignore it for so long before these dreams catch up with him.

He sits on his usual booth and deplores how quick of an habit he’s uselessly built—but before he can think anything out of it, he overhears the quiet conversation between the waiter and his colleague, a young bleached-haired girl standing by the counter.

“No, I’ll go,” the boy says, and Jean stares at his phone screen, but it’s locked, and he only catches his own reflection.

“Are you sure? It’s my table,” the girl says, but Jean hears fabric rustling and hurried steps.

“I’ll take care of this one,” he reassures, “take your break.”

The girl seems to hesitate for a moment, because nothing happens, but then a door closes and silence settles. Jean focuses on the background music but he doesn’t recognize it. It’s not like he really listens to the radio lately, does he? And suddenly that boy’s standing before the table in his usual black apron, smile less timid than it perhaps had been before.

“Happy to see you back,” he says, and there’s a sinking feeling in his guts when he realizes the boy is being honest. He has mastered the art of spotting empty smiles, and this is none of them.

At first, Jean isn’t sure what to answer, and politely smiles back. Then something tickles and he feels an unexpected rush of honesty he can’t quite hold back, and it’s out before he can help himself. “Same goes for you.”

This is all but what the waiter had expected, he knows, because his eyes light up oddly and he seems to gain confidence. It’s easy to see he’s exhausted, but Jean isn’t in the best position to point out people’s questionable sleeping schedules. He hasn’t had a good night of sleep in years after all.

He pulls on his own fingers under the table, trying to balance out the fatigue-induced nervousness by keeping his hands busy. The boy looks younger when he smiles, he thinks—and then—

“I’m Neil, by the way,” he’s offered without asking.

Jean looks down Neil’s chest. “Your tag says otherwise,” he points out.

“Yeah, huh. That’s because the manager is dropping by today. This is why I have to wear my employee tag, and this is why you can’t have free pie today.”

Jean snorts, and the reaction encourages Neil to go on.

“I guess you will survive with that anyway. You don’t seem like a big eater.”

Jean looks away, and Neil feels it—it’s a mistake, the first he’s ever made. He can feel the boy panicking to try and make up for it, but all he ends up doing is back away in self-hatred.

“Coffee, I suppose.” The smile is gone and Jean almost regrets it.

“Yes please.” He hesitates for a second, peeping at the tag. “Nathaniel?”

“Neil,” he corrects. “Just Neil.”

“Then, Just Neil,” he says, “I’d like that.”

Neil nods and he thinks he catches a glimpse of another smile. He’s pretty sure he’s never seen Neil smile to any other customer, and he feels content, he feels real.

The coffee isn’t that good, and he hates the music, but Jean finds himself unable to leave when his cup is empty. He checks his phone again and again, waiting for Kevin’s text, waiting for anything, any sign that might guide him a way or another. Forcefully erasing himself had always been easier than to leave on his own, and, at least, it gave him the opportunity to resent other people for the choices he didn’t really make. Sitting there, on this booth, though, he realized there were some decisions he had consciously made these last few days, and he felt sick.

He was a ghost, only a ghost, and that was all he was ever going to be.

 

“Already leaving?” Neil asks when Jean gets up to put his coat on. For a boy who didn’t strike him as talkative, every word is priceless and he knows it. It’s worry, and interest, it’s everything he doesn’t bother giving the other customers, hardly even his coworkers. Jean has observed it all, by now.

There’s blades in his throat when he speaks up.

“I can’t stay any longer,” Jean somberly replies.

“Maybe tomorrow,” Neil tries—and it sounds like a question. It sounds like a choked hope.

“I really can’t.”

Neil’s face goes from mildly pensive to baffled, and it takes a few seconds for the boy to gain composure again. Silence stretches and Jean feels guilty, ever so guilty.

“Alright then,” Neil nods. “Any chances of you coming back?”

“I rarely go back to the places I have been before.” This has always applied, even to coffee shops like this one. Perhaps this is why he can’t explain himself how he came back again and again. It isn't a rule, but it is a habit, and now that he has broken it he isn't sure he wants to leave.

Jean stands there, fatigued and terrified to move. It takes a moment for either to breathe again.

“You didn’t tell me your name,” Neil remembers in a hurry.

“It’s Jean,” he says, and before he can register it, he’s smiling. It’s meek, and clumsy, like he hasn’t quite done it in a long time, but it’s sincere enough that Neil gets the gist and smiles back.

He tries to turn away to leave, but he has this ever growing sense that he is right where he is supposed to be, right where he wants to stay. It makes him sick to the guts, and bitter with the fear of losing something he’d never really had. Letting go of almosts was so much more painful than what once had been.

Could’ve beens were unanswered questions, they were weights to haunt him forever, and Jean is haunted enough as it is.

“Take care, Neil,” he says, and tries to savor every syllable of it.

He waits for the waiter to reply, but his gaze is fixed on the floor tiles, waiting patiently, and he takes advantage of the liberty to observe his freckles one last time. There’s a small scar across his brow, Jean notices now, and decides is a ridiculous thing to notice when he’s never going to see him again.

Neil’s eyes flicker up to meet his, eventually, and for a second, they look like they’re going to say something. Then Jean is out the door, and Neil watches him leave without looking back.


	2. Indulge Yourself

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Listen to [Reminiscence by Olafur Arnalds](https://youtu.be/hffMLTmRe9A).

He wakes up in sweat, in a shabby hotel room he isn’t sure he wants to leave. It takes a moment to remember, but when he does, he sits on the edge of the bed and rubs his face until it starts to burn.

“No, no, no,” he grunts, but the images still fresh in his mind can’t possibly be wrong.

He has seen it all before.

He has dreamed it, again and again, he has seen all these foreign faces he’s never even met. Jean had been told, years ago, that human brains couldn’t make up faces in dreams: those were intricate combinations of people he had crossed paths with before, an endless stock of subconscious memories for his decor to be built.

This, he knows, wasn’t decor. It wasn’t even memory.

It was something that hadn’t happened—yet.

“Leave me alone,” he pleads, and pulls on the strands of black hair sticking to his sweaty forehead. “I don’t want this anymore.” He looks up to the ceiling and his face twists, holding back all the pain it took to wake up and take it in. “Putain,” he mutters in strained French.

But nobody answers.

 

He leaves the state by noon, and parks two blocks down Neil’s café by the evening. It’s something blurry between nine and ten p.m., families going out for dinner and flocks of teenagers searching for distraction in crowded streets, but he can tell through the large window bays that nobody has settled for the coffee shop tonight.

It is as empty as can get, and Jean only spots one customer in the far back. It makes his throat tighten with nervousness, like, perhaps, he hasn’t planned to go that far and doesn’t know what to do.

He knows he can’t leave again, however. This hasn’t been an accident, this hasn’t been a quiet nothing. Jean isn’t sure he believes in fate, but if fate there ever is, then Neil is the closest thing to it.

The bell chimes his entrance and Neil looks up behind the counter. Jean watches as surprise freezes him in place and his face turns warmer with the seconds, until, somehow, a tired smile splits it in two.

“Jean,” he says. He isn’t sure he’s heard his name in his mouth before, and he takes the time to savor the sound of it. It is low and unsure, and makes him feel like Neil didn’t dare hope this to be true. He wonders if Neil has seen his ghost as Jean has seen his, but he can’t possibly stretch reality that far.

“Today is the day,” he says, but it is somber and empty, and he feels sick. He tries a wobbly smile and Neil rushes around the counter to stand before him.

“Well, you’ve got quite the room,” Neil nods in a professional tone, out of habit surely, as he points at the available booths. He doesn’t realize Jean’s gaze hasn’t followed at all.

“No,” Jean says. It sounds stern, but it isn’t. “I’ll sit by the counter this time.”

Neil’s brows flicker up and down in surprise, but he is quick to gain his composure again. “Sure.” He wipes his palms on his apron and disappears behind the counter.

It is strange, greeting a stranger who isn’t quite one. What are they? They can’t tell. Something oddly familiar, like they have lived it before. Jean knows it isn’t quite the case. He knows way too much.

Panic rushes through his veins at the thought, but he chokes it down and sits on the first stool he comes across.

He puts his cellphone on the counter, then crosses his arms and waits, taping nervous fingers against his arm in disharmony with the background music. This is a nice, clean place to be, something modern and classy young hipsters like to frequent, but tonight it looks every bit like an abandoned restaurant in a horror movie. Neon lights above him are flickering, weakly, soon giving up—and all the sleek colors merge into one gloomy mess as the music fades behind the kitchen’s noises. The customer in the back doesn’t ever look up.

“Here,” Neil says as he slides a cup of coffee his way. Jean nods in appreciation and wraps his fingers around the warm cup, even though it is the middle of August and a little too hot for anything steamy. Perhaps that’s why he says, what ice cream do you have, and perhaps is that why Neil responds, anything for you.

He knows Neil was only expecting him to be a picky eater, but this still makes him blush.

“Surprise me,” Jean says, and it sounds too sad not to be genuine.

He can feel Neil’s gaze through the kitchen opening as he makes his dessert, and he wonders if this was a good idea.

“Are you,” Jean starts, and Neil looks up in a short breath. He can practically see hope fading in his chilly eyes as he shakes his head. “Never mind.”

Neil tries a polite smile and puts the bowl in front of him, but something’s broken and he knows it. He stays there, nonetheless, and Jean doesn’t look away.

“Am I what,” Neil tries again in a mumble. He’s trying to spark it up again, that tiny bit of hope, he’s trying to force the words out of Jean. He looks equally scared and provocative, which is something odd to witness, and Jean frowns at the fascinating sight.

“Nothing,” he mutters.

“Why did you come back?” Neil asks suddenly. He knows he might as well ask the right questions if he doesn’t at least get the answers he wants.

Jean stares. It takes a minute, but it comes out eventually. “For you.” There’s no point in lying this time, and it feels right just telling him. Why else would he come back anyway?

Neil doesn’t smile, but his cheeks tint in dusty pink and he looks away, half-embarrassed half-pleased. “Then why don’t you ask me out,” he presses, and it sounds bitter with premature cynicism. Jean’s given him all the answers he needs to be sure of it, but Neil still looks every bit ready to give up on the hope, and Jean knows that’s why he makes a point not to meet his eyes.

Jean leans forward on the counter, fingers tightening around his own arm as he does. “I don’t ask people out.” He can’t seem to remember a time he has. A long time ago, perhaps—and even then, it’s a risky bet. Neil looks like he’s going to run away to the kitchen to escape the embarrassment of being told no, but then Jean says, “don’t leave.”

“I’m not going anywhere,” Neil snaps back a little too quick. There’s a reproach in that and Jean knows it: it’s been weeks since he’s last visited the café. Neil was pretty sure he’d never see him again. Thinking about it, now, that’s probably the best thing that could have happened to him.

Jean’s face turns dark with the knowledge of it, and he stares at the reflection in his coffee cup. He almost expects Neil to go away in exasperation, but he can feel the boy standing right there in front of him, observing his every move in a half-worried frown.

“Why did you leave?” Neil asks. It’s dry, but it’s softer somehow.

“Not the right one,” he shakes his head. Neil figures he’s talking about the questions.

“Then why did you come here in the first place?”

Jean looks up, tired. “Because I don’t know where to go.” Neil frowns a little deeper when he spots Jean’s teary eyes. He steps closer to the counter until they’re too close for strangers’ courtesy, and Jean can see his Adam’s apple bob up and down in apprehension.

Jean doesn’t look like someone who cries for nothing.

And Neil looks like he knows every bit what pain feels like.

“Then stay,” Neil says, and it almost sounds like he’s pleading. It might be.

Slowly, Jean nods. “Okay,” he breathes out, and it’s sharp and desperate and Neil knows he was this close to bursting into tears. “Okay.” The customer isn’t paying attention to them, so Jean doesn’t mind being seen; no matter how prideful, no matter how weak.

It’s a relief for a moment, but then it’s heavy again—what to say, Jean doesn’t know. He’s never done this before, and he’s never felt this close to a panic attack.

Neil breaks the ice first. “Where are you staying tonight?”

Jean points at the street on the left without turning back. “The hotel down the avenue.”

Neil looks through the window for a moment, gaze searching, pensive; then he nods to himself. “No need,” he says, “come to my place.”

Jean looks up in sheer surprise and Neil blushes as he realizes.

“I have a couch,” he adds.

Jean snorts at Neil’s sudden embarrassment, and he watches as Neil disappears into the kitchen. Whether it’s to hide or to prevent him from turning Neil down, he doesn’t know.

 

It’s eleven p.m. when Neil finally clocks out, and Jean doesn’t mind the waiting. Scattered conversations as Neil walked by were pleasant enough, and he got drunk on the opportunity to observe him shamelessly whenever he was in plain sight. The way his curls bounced on the front, light and voluminous; the way his brows arched in concentration whenever he was doing something delicate; perhaps even the meek smile he gave him and only him. Jean thinks he can get used to that.

Neil’s place is a tiny duplex in a tranquil dead-end, and when they get in, Neil doesn’t turn the lights on.

“I live with Renee,” he says, then adds, “my coworker.” Jean remembers catching a glimpse of a girl the other day, but he doesn’t care enough to truly recall. He nods. “The rent’s easier to pay when we’re two, and it’s close enough to the coffee shop.”

“You don’t have to explain yourself,” Jean says.

“I know.” Neil looks around. It’s dark and lacks ventilation, but it’s cozy. “It’s… in case,” he tries, but gets uneasy and chuckles. Jean likes the sound of it. “To prevent bad surprises in case…” he tries again, and shakes his head.

“In case what?” Jean teases, but he looks all the more serious.

Neil doesn’t answer, but he looks up, and Jean steps closer.

In the dark, it’s easier—it feels less wrong. He resists the urge to put a hand on Neil’s cheek, and whatever goes through Neil’s mind is thoroughly restrained.

“In case we indulge ourselves.”

Jean stops breathing. He’s taller than him by several inches, and Neil’s craning his neck to catch his gaze. He knows they should kiss now, but neither does.

“The couch is right there,” he says, but it sounds half-hopeful. Jean doesn’t provide whatever he had meekly waited for, so Neil nods. “I’ll let you change and go to sleep. You can use the bathroom and the kitchen all you want. Unless you want the bedroom? You can take my bed,” he adds, polite and shy, but Jean only laughs.

It’s a quiet, short and weak laughter, but Neil hears it—and shuts up. Jean’s face goes blank and he stares, swallowing dry. He didn’t even realize he was laughing.

“So,” Jean starts, and his voice trembles. He can feel the attraction between them like he can almost touch it, and it’s overwhelming. He can’t explain it. “Do we indulge ourselves?” he asks, and it’s half a permission he asks for.

Neil stares like he can’t quite believe what he’s told. “Yes,” he hastily nods. “Yes, fuck yes,” and pulls on the front of Jean’s white t-shirt. He doesn’t do much more than that, however, and though the distance is reduced, Jean doesn’t feel self-conscious.

He cups Neil’s face with his two hands and makes him look up. It’s hard to breathe when he brushes his lips against Neil’s temple, and it’s hard to stand when Neil slips greedy palms underneath the front of his shirt. Their breaths hitch and they close the distance.

“We can stop,” Jean says, because they can.

The only response he gets is Neil’s hand down his pants and soft lips lining up his jaw until they find his. Jean whines against his lips and slides a hand to the back of his neck, parting his lips to let him in, and he doesn’t think he’s ever felt this good before. Time ceases to exist, dreams cease to matter, and for a moment he’s only himself.

It’s haunting, how much he’s wanted Neil and didn’t even know it until now. Confusing, how strongly they attract one another even as they barely know each other’s names. But they let go anyway, stripping of their clothes one piece at a time, stumbling until they hit the back of Neil’s couch and throw themselves on it.

Jean doesn’t pause long enough to process anything, and he can’t comprehend how someone so easily uneasy can be so confident and cheeky at the same time. He doesn’t point it out, doesn’t complain either—not when Neil straddles his bare hips and hooks a tender arm around his neck.

This feels more than sex and he knows it. It’s like going too far, like something you can’t take back. The completion of a curse, the yes to an unspoken question. It could’ve been arousing, but it’s only desperate—it’s rough and hurried and hopeless like they only have five minutes left to live and none to waste.

Jean throws his head back when Neil slides down on him. They breathe hard, clutching onto each other’s faces and bodies to make sure they don’t leave, to make sure they don’t wake up only to realize it was all a dream. Neil kisses him until he’s out of breath, and Jean runs protective hands down his hips to hold him there, rocking his hips up in greed, and Neil moans incoherent words into his mouth.

It’s so intense Jean thinks he might die. His chest is tight with desire and he grabs Neil’s face to bring him close, to keep him deep, not knowing what he will do when his nightmares catch up with reality.

This is insane, he knows it—falling for a stranger he knows nothing about, but he can tell there is something unusual. Invisible ropes tie them down to one another, and they’re unwilling to cut any. The damage is done.

Jean wraps his arms around Neil’s body and pulls him close as Neil drops down and pulls himself back up again. The motion is so blurry and strained he can barely breathe, but then he pulls on Jean’s hair and moans something desperate.

He doesn’t expect Neil to grab his hand and throw it on his own mouth, but Jean complies and presses it to his lips to muffle the sound as Neil throws his head back and stills, shaking violently. They stay like that for a few seconds, breathless and covered in sweat, but then Neil collapses against him swivels his hips. To his ear, he says: “my roommate is asleep in her room,” but before Jean can protest, Neil’s hammering himself back down and Jean cries out.

He puts his own hand to his mouth to shut himself up but Neil stares and, slowly, pulls Jean’s hand away.

“I want to hear you.”

This is all it takes for Jean to lose it, and Neil holds himself down as he trembles underneath, hands grasping at anything they can reach, back arching and throat tight with grunts way too desperate—and, perhaps, Neil’s name in between.

He opens his eyes moments later, and Neil’s still there, a soft and ghostly smile plastered on his lips. They don’t say anything and Neil sprawls himself on top of him, pulling himself up just long enough for Jean to pull out. They stay like that for what seems to be an eternity, not caring that they could be caught—and they breathe deep, Neil’s cheek on his shoulder, Jean’s arms holding him tight.

Why it feels so comfortable pulling him close, he doesn’t know. He doesn’t want to know. Deep down, Jean is aware of the terrible thing he has done, of the terrible grief he’s inflicting himself unnecessarily, but falling in love with Neil doesn’t feel like something he can ever help.

And so he lets go.


	3. What A Shame

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Listen to [Experience by Ludovico Einaudi](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kjlu9RRHcbE).

He wakes up to the sound of glass breaking, and grabs the sheets in blurry panic—but laughters follow, mixed and muffled, distant enough to be real. Jean looks around, confused for a moment; but then Neil appears in the doorframe and his smile wavers, surprised.

“You’re up,” he says, and steps closer to the bed. “Did we wake you?”

Jean isn’t sure. “No.”

Neil stares, gentle, and then crawls onto the bed, leaving the door wide open. He can hear someone picking up the pieces of glass and throwing them in the trash, but all he can see is Neil. He’s in underwear and a pain blue t-shirt he thinks makes his eyes stand out—and when Neil collapses onto his lap, Jean lets him.

He runs delicate fingers through Neil’s curls as he speaks. “What time is it?”

Neil frowns to try and do the math. “Past six.”

“In the morning?”

“In the afternoon,” Neil smiles.

Jean’s heart stops, but there’s more than a reason why. “I didn’t mean to sleep so l—”

“Hey,” Neil says abruptly as he sits upright, one hand on the other side of Jean’s body. “Hey, it’s okay, who cares. It’s Sunday.”

Jean stares for a blank second, then realizes. “I haven’t slept this well in…” something tightens in him, and he looks away. “In a very long time.” The hand he feels against his cheek makes him jump, but he eases into the touch and closes his eyes.

“Am I that boring to make you pass out for so long,” he asks, “or did you stay asleep to avoid me?”

“No, it’s—” Jean rushes.

Neil cupped his face to shut him up. “I’m kidding,” he says, and crawls out of his lap.

Jean watches him, dumbfounded. Then Neil disappears into the living room and he can hear distant chattering from the kitchen, and he falls back against the bedhead. What is he doing? He doesn’t know. He’s never really known.

 

“So you must be Jean,” Renee says when he comes out of the room. He’s hardly dressed, but she doesn’t seem to mind, a warm and genuine smile across her pale face. She extends a hand, and he shakes it with uncertainty.

“So I heard,” he nods. She chuckles and he searches for Neil.

Renee picks up on it right away. “He’s in the bathroom getting ready. Do you want me to cook you something?”

Jean’s guts drop. “No, thank you.” He can’t tell the last time he’s eaten a solid dish, and even Neil’s offering last night was hard to process. He knows, deep down, he’s developing some kind of messed up disorder, but he can’t bring himself to care.

“As you want,” she accepts, and turns to keep picking up the pieces of glass.

Jean watches for a moment before realizing how impolite it is. He kneels by her side and reaches for a big piece, uncaring how sharp it might be. She gasps and frowns, worried, but Jean’s okay. “Let me help.”

He doesn’t wait for permission before gathering the scattered pieces, and when he feels her gaze fixed on him, doesn’t address it. He doesn’t need it, because she says:

“I think he likes you.” His eyes flicker up to meet hers, surprised and unsettled. “He wouldn’t admit it, but he likes you.” Renee smiled, and it made Jean feel terrible. “Neil was pretty messed up, when you left. He was convinced you were here to stay, convinced you lived here.”

“I don’t live anywhere,” he corrects, gravely.

“It’s okay,” she shrugs. “Some people don’t find their place until late. And some don’t need a home.” It’s almost surreal, but she adds, “you can stay here as long as you want to.”

Then she goes back to the broken glass and it’s Jean’s turn to stare. It takes two tries to find his voice. “Thank you,” he mumbles, but it’s shaky and terrified. He wishes he could tell her.

“What are you two doing?” Neil asks when he comes out of the bathroom, and Jean clears his throat as he gets up, glass in the palm of his hand.

“He’s giving me a helping hand,” Renee says without looking up. She’s on all fours now, and the pastel purple sweater she’s wearing lifts up mid-back to reveal a faded tattoo.

“You don’t have to,” Neil assures.

“I know.”

There isn’t much to add.

“Renee is going out for dinner with her mother,”  he says as Renee gets up to drop all the glass in the trash. “I’m staying here, but we could do something too if you want to.”

“No,” Jean says, and shakes his head. “No it’s fine. I’m fine.”

“Are you sure?”

“I just want to be with you,” Jean says, and looks to the side. It’s almost too hard to let the words out when he knows what’s going to happen.

Neil doesn’t smile, nor does he turn away. Jean feels the weight of his eyes and it’s making it hard to breathe, and he can feel how much Neil resists the need to reach out and touch. He wishes he hadn’t.

“Do you like Chinese, then?”

Jean nods, but he waits for Neil to take that in and step away to finally look up. He feels like he’s choking, and then something vibrates on the bedside table and he runs to Neil’s room before the call can end. The name on his screen is a breath of fresh air and he almost chokes again.

“Hello?” he asks, voice strained and tired.

“Jean,” Kevin says.

Jean closes his eyes.

“It’s been days, what were you doing? It’s been—” he sighs, closes the door and lets himself drop against it until he hits the floor. “It’s been days,” he repeats, and it’s not hard to guess he’s holding back a panicked sob.

“You found him,” Kevin says, not quite a question.

“I found him.”

There’s a cold silence.

“This time it might be different.” It’s aiming for optimistic, but Kevin’s never been good at those sorts of things, and Jean only laughs in bitter resentment. “I’m serious. You found him in time, and you’re there, you…” Kevin loses track of what he was trying to say and sighs.

Jean considers telling him he’s locked up in his bedroom, considers confessing he’s let Neil bring him home and fuck him on the couch. It doesn’t feel like a good idea.

“You should tell him,” Kevin concludes after a while.

Jean shakes his head in silence, even though Kevin can’t see it. He shakes it again and again, ever quicker, like the suggestion disgusts him a little more with the seconds.

“I can’t do that. You know I can’t.”

“You found him,” Kevin says. “He needs to know. Wouldn’t you want to know?”

“I can’t fucking do that, Kevin,” Jean snaps sharply. “I can’t break him like that. I wouldn’t bear it.”

Silence follows and he closes his eyes, knowing fully what Kevin’s lack of response means.

“You got too close, didn’t you?”

Jean doesn’t reply.

“What did you fucking do?”

“I didn’t do anything,” Jean spits out. It’s not quite the truth, but it’s not like he really wanted any of this to happen.

“We’d agreed on the matter Jean. We’d promised we wouldn’t get too close to them. That you even found him in time is… fuck, Jean, it’s a miracle. Why push your luck that much?”

Jean throws a hand against his mouth to muffle the sob he knows is coming. Kevin must have heard it through the phone, because his voice softens and he speaks in a whisper.

“Jean, you must tell him.”

Jean rubs his eye with the heel of his palm and shakes his head, pulling on strands of hair—but reality is still there, as heavy and as terrifying, and he thinks he might do whatever it takes to make it stop. He knows Kevin’s not the right person to say that to, but he only has him.

“I can’t lose him,” he shakes as he opens his eyes, and remembers the dream Neil was in. Wishes it was only a dream. Wishes his mind had been able to wander at night, to rest, to hope for better things. “It’s not fair,” he lets out, and he knows he’s going to regret the confession, but surprisingly, Kevin doesn’t get angry again.

“No it isn’t,” he sighs eventually. “I know it isn’t.”

 

Sprawled on opposite ends of Neil and Renee’s couch, legs and feet tangled there, they’re searching for the remaining bits of spicy noodles as they handle their chopsticks. They’ve spent the evening watching television together, laughing heartedly and content just being together—but now Jean’s out of distraction and he stares at the bottom of his noodle box to try and find some miracle. There is none.

“What’s troubling you?” Neil asks, and Jean realizes he’s been stared at all along.

“Nothing,” he smiles, but it’s as shaky as the first one he ever gave him. Neil picks up on it instantly and sits upright, putting his own box on the floor next to him to lean in the space between them, suddenly serious.

“You can tell me.”

Jean smiles again, and this time—it’s genuine, but it’s broken. It rips Neil’s heart out to watch. “No I really can’t.”

“How can you be so sure?”

“Because things like that… they change everything. You can’t take them back.” He pokes a piece of pepper with his chopstick then decides he’s not hungry enough. He rarely is. He puts the box on the floor in his turn but then it’s harder not to look at Neil and he almost regrets it.

“Are you sick?” Neil tries, cautious.

“What?”

“I don’t know, like… a cancer, a terminal disease, something incurable? Because… I wouldn’t run away, you know. I’m not that terrible.”

For a short moment Jean wishes roles were reversed, just so that Neil could have the opportunity to run away at all. These things can’t be run away from.

A hand rests on Jean’s calf and he looks at it, pensive.

“It’s not about me,” he says, eventually. “Not quite.”

“Is it…” Neil looks at the television. “Is it about me then?” He waits, because he knows it’ll take a little more to force answers out of Jean. “Did I do something?”

“No,” Jean smiles.

He grabs Neil’s wrist to pull him closer, and Neil falls on top of him. He cups his face as Neil holds his own weight and the look they exchange is, perhaps, the saddest one.

“You didn’t do anything,” he reassures, and pushes a red curl behind Neil’s ear. He lets his thumb trace over the small scar cutting the middle of Neil’s brow, thoughtful. “When I was eighteen I went out with a few friends, in France. We were young and fearless at that time, and just like everyone else, we tried to speed up everything to feel something.”

“What happened?”

“We got in a car accident on the highway, at night. We were four and I was the only one to survive it.”

Neil’s eyes drop, half-closed, and Jean caresses his cheek to show him it’s okay. He’s okay.

“The thing is, I technically didn’t survive.” At that, Neil’s eyes catch his again and he can tell the confusion he finds there is only innocent. “I died, that night. And they brought me back. I was dead for… two minutes, perhaps three. That’s an awful long time to be gone.”

Neil stays silent, but he nods between Jean’s hands.

“And when I woke up I was different.”

“What do you mean by different?”

Jean sighs and turns his head to look at the television. Then he frowns, remembering something distant, just out of reach. “Do you remember the first time we met?” He feels Neil’s smile even if he doesn’t look, and it warms his heart a little. Then it tightens again and everything hurts.

“Of course I do.”

“I told you I’d come back from a social event, didn’t I?” he asks because he’s not sure, but Neil nods, amused.

“Yeah. I tried to flirt but it didn’t work.”

“It’s not your fault. I don’t get into the habit of getting close to anyone. It’s too dangerous,” he explains, but before Neil can ask why, he goes on: “it wasn’t a social event, whatever that might mean. It was a funeral.”

Neil’s worry comes back in the same breath and he meets his eyes.

“Don’t worry,” he smiles, exhausted and far-off. “No one close to me.”

“Then why did you go?”

“Because I didn’t make it.”

Neil’s brows flicker in confusion again. “Didn’t make what?”

“In time,” Jean says. “I didn’t find them in time.”

Neil starts to understand this is all but a funny little story to tell in the nighttime and sits upright on Jean’s lap, palms holding himself on his clothed torso. He looks angry, but Jean knows he’s not—it’s puzzlement, and he’s been there before.

“At night I…” he tries, but his voice breaks and he has to look away. “I have dreams. Terrible dreams.”

Neil tries to do the math. “Is that why you slept for so long last night?”

Jean runs a hand up in Neil’s hair again, tender. “That was the first time I could really sleep in a long, long time.”

“Did you make any dreams?”

“No,” Jean frowns. “I didn’t.” And now that he thinks of it, he should have. He holds the naïve hope of it being gone for good for a moment, but then he shakes his head. “I think it’s going to come back soon.”

“Why do you think that?”

“Because I found you,” Jean says, and when he smiles it’s broken and fearful. His eyes tear up again, and Neil slides a hand up to the side of his neck.

“Hey, don’t,” he says when Jean looks about to burst into tears. “It’s okay, I’m here.”

“I know,” Jean nods and closes his eyes. “But you were in my dreams.”

Neil laughs lightly, and Jean can’t bear the sound of it when it fades, realizing it’s no joke. “What?”

Silence settles, heavy, and Neil withdraws his hand.

“I dreamed of you. That’s why I came back.”

Neil looks to the side, and for a moment Jean thinks he’s going to leave him there. But he doesn’t, and Neil’s weight on top of him is oddly reassuring. He doesn’t want the boy to ever leave.

That’s the problem.

“These dreams,” Neil starts. “What are they?”

“Nightmares,” Jean explains. “That’s what I used to call them after my accident. Now I call them visions.”

Neil’s distressed face turns to him so quickly he almost thinks of looking away.

“Don’t kid me,” Neil grunts.

“I’m serious.”

Neil looks away again, taking it in.

“What kind of visions?”

Jean smiles, and it shakes with hurt. “Death.”

The trembling hand Neil lifts goes up to his own mouth and he stays there in silence, processing what Jean has just confessed. This doesn’t only mean Jean has trouble sleeping: this means he’s seen Neil’s death, and he’s not sure what he’s supposed to do with that knowledge now. Dread settles but soon doubt and skepticism take over, and Jean knows he’s only being rational to protect himself.

“It’s not funny.” Jean doesn’t say anything. “How can I believe you?”

Jean doesn’t have any other means than this: “Do you trust me?”

Silence replies. Of course he does.

“It’s not enough,” Neil decides, troubled. “I need proof.”

Jean closes his eyes, rubs them until it hurts. Tries to remember. “You were… you were wearing that black sweater with something red on it. Or orange, perhaps. And you were late. To work, I think. You crossed the road and…” Jean stops there, voice derailed.

Neil fixes his gaze on him.

“And what?”

“And you didn’t look.”

Neil shivers.

“Has this happened yet?” Jean tries, hopeful despite himself. “Did you almost get killed?”

“No,” Neil says. He can’t think of any instance late enough to be important. “But…” he starts, and massages his temple. He gets off Jean’s lap and disappears, and for a moment, Jean thinks he’s not coming back. He sits up and waits, grave—then Neil’s standing before him, holding up something he knows he’s seen before.

“But there’s this,” Neil says, and Jean recognizes the sweater he’s seen in his dream. He stares at the red logo, heart heavy. He thinks he can’t breathe, but he can’t be sure. “I bought this yesterday.” What Neil implies is quite clear: he hasn’t worn it yet. Unless Jean had gone through his stuff, there was no way he could have known.

Jean’s face twists with fear and horror, and he knows he’s going to cry again. It’s too hard not to. It’s too terrible to bear. This weight, this responsibility, this witness status he’s never wanted. He needs to rest.

He needs Neil.

The sweater drops to the floor and Jean wraps his arms around Neil’s legs, nesting his head against his stomach. Neil’s arms close around him instantly, and he hears Neil swallow hard.

“What happens now?”

“I don’t know,” Jean chokes in between sobs, and Neil runs loving hands into his black hair to try and soothe him. It feels wrong: he should be the one comforting Neil, after all. But Neil holds him with the ferocity he needs, and for a moment it even feels like they might find a way out of this.

As naïve as it is.

“Does this mean I shouldn’t wear this?” he says, and peeps at the sweater balled up on the floor.

“No,” Jean lets out, tired. “Now that you know, everything’s different.” He feels a pinch of guilt and thinks, perhaps, he should have kept this all to himself. At least he would have been able to tell when things were about to go south. Now, he’s lost. “The sweater, the road… you’re going to make sure this doesn’t happen.”

“But doesn’t this mean I’m safe?”

Jean looks up, chin against Neil’s torso. “I don’t know.” He frowns, pained. “I’ve never been this far.”

“I’m the first one you found,” Neil figures.

“You’re the first one I find alive,” Jean corrects, somber, silent tear running down his cheek. Neil can see all the fatigue and terror, all these haunted nights Jean hasn’t been able to sleep. He’s broken.

Neil drops to his knees and cups Jean’s face between his hands. They’re warm, but shaky, and Jean puts his own on top of his to steady them. He can’t tell which is more terrified.

“I feel something,” Neil shakes his head, convinced of something. “I feel something I’ve never felt before.”

Jean eases into the touch, knowing. “I know. I couldn’t stray away from you.”

“But you did,” Neil says, and Jean picks up all the far-off resentment he tries to conceal in that tone.

“I did because I thought I was going to have to leave. I did because I thought these dreams were coming back, and I didn’t know—I didn’t know where I was going to have to go. It could have been anywhere.” He looks down. “I was sick and tired of arriving too late to change anything.”

Neil’s gaze grows dark. “The funeral,” he says. Jean nods in between his hands without looking up.

It takes a moment for Jean to find his voice, and another tear rolls down, so tranquil and out of place it’s almost wrong. “She was seventeen.” He knows because that’s what the people at the funeral told. They’d said, she was only seventeen, they’d said, what a shame.

Jean had directed all that shame his way, overwhelmingly guilty for not being able to save her in time—and for a long time he’d considered getting into a bar to drown his sadness in alcohol. He’d gone to Neil’s café instead.

He tries to imagine what Neil’s funeral would look like. Renee, face frozen in pain, holding his band by the casket. He was only twenty-three, they’d all say—what a shame.


	4. Called Me A Miracle

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Listen to [Fill Your Brains by Harrison Brome](https://youtu.be/eGlChz5hIBg), [Vantaback by Novo Amor](https://youtu.be/d_QCqAD7pn4) and [Disappear by Parachute](https://youtu.be/gbKgE2r7vjE).

“Renee’s staying at her mother’s tonight.”

Jean nods, but there’s no enthusiasm. “Did you tell her?”

“No. I’m not sure I can even realize it myself. I told her we needed time alone, and she understands.”

Jean nods again. After all, that wasn’t quite a lie. He’s in boxers already, and Neil strips in his turn as Jean checks the temperature. The water is steamy, hot enough to numb enough, and Jean stares at it for a moment, lost in his thoughts—until a soft hand brushes his bare hip.

“Are you okay?” Neil asks.

“I should be the one to ask you this,” Jean closes his eyes; but Neil puts his other hand on his cheek to make him face him. He doesn’t open his eyes for all that, but he eases into the touch like a touch-starved animal or a cuddly child.

Neil crouches to pull on Jean’s boxers and leaves a ghostly kiss on his lower stomach before getting up. Jean grabs his wrist and they get into the bathtub, sighing slowly as they get under the water flow, and it doesn’t take long for them to wrap their arms around each other. Naked and vulnerable, they’re the most fragile they’ve ever been, but nobody cries.

Jean thinks he might be numb.

As for Neil, he’s still in shock, he knows. Maybe that’s for the better. When it hits—it’ll be painful.

They hold each other in silence, though there’s an old 40’s song playing in the living room. From the TV, they assume, and slowly they start to move in tiny bits, dancing off-beat under the water. Their bodies make only one, and Jean thinks he’d give everything to save him.

He’s not sure he would have done so much for the others. For those he couldn’t save. Neil—he’s different. Something about him, he knows, draws him closer; something terrible that makes him feel like leaving again might kill him for good. No matter how sick and dreadful he feels, resting his face in the crook of Neil’s neck feels like being home, feels like breathing again after choking on water for too long. It’s relief, in all forms, in forms he didn’t know existed, and he’s scared to the bone to let go.

Not that they ever do, and they can’t tell how much time has passed when they part just enough to gaze at each other.

“I’m not ready,” Neil whispers.

“I won’t let it happen,” Jean whispers back.

 

Things start to blur after that. They spend Neil’s shifts at the café and Neil’s days off at home, tangled in Neil’s bed or sprawled on the couch. They go on nightrides in Jean’s shitty car, and they talk about memories they didn’t even think they remembered. Neil savors every minute, and Jean—Jean sleeps, a lot, more than he’s ever.

Neil is a magnet, he realizes, and a cure both; and every day spent by his side brings him closer to something soft and tender he’s never dared hope for. As for Neil, he seems happy, Jean notices, and sometimes they forget all about it.

Jean meets all of Neil’s friends, and Neil learns about Kevin and how they found each other through their blurry post-death experience. He tells about how Kevin was there when he woke up from his two-day coma, how Kevin had dreamed of Jean’s death. Jean was the first one Kevin had ever managed to find, and Jean was the only one who’d ever believed him. They’d spent years trying to find people like them, people who’d been gone and then back, a little different, a little haunted—years trying to find those they dreamed of to try and change the course of time, thinking they were a message from the universe. Perhaps it wasn’t, and perhaps it was hopeless, Jean knew; perhaps fate could never be countered and there was nothing to change at all. But neither Kevin nor Jean knew why they had those night visions, and it was all they could do to try and make them bearable. How many deaths they had been unable to prevent, they didn’t know—they’d lost count long, long ago.

Neil’s friends were a heteroclite bunch of nice people who all, in good intentions, frowned at him at first. Then, conversation after conversation, night out after night out, dinner after dinner in the summery sunsets of Renee and Neil’s terrace, they all started to understand what Neil found in him. It wasn’t in his social skills, or the way he behaved—but how close he always was to Neil, how closely he watched over him, and how quick Neil’s eyes were to search for his whenever something happened. Danielle had come up at Jean’s sides then, as her boyfriend Matt and Neil took care of the tiny barbecue, and she’d whispered: do you know people tend to look at those they love after a joke? She’d told him this was a human reflex, a need to check their loved ones’ reaction. Each time Matt joked, Neil instinctively searched for Jean’s eyes, and, each time, they held each other’s in quiet tenderness.

It was easy to see how strong their unspoken bond was, how codependent and trustworthy both were to each other. On the same wavelengths most of the time, they didn’t even need to voice out their thoughts, and Renee never ceased to be amazed at the way they communicated by merely glancing at the other. Dinners with the three of them were a soft thing Jean looked forward to, and he learned to appreciate Renee’s overly kind attitude, eventually deciding it was too innocent to be hypocritical. Sometimes the three of them would go out in a bar and Renee would older a lemonade; sometimes they would marathon movies in the living room and Renee would disappear by eleven, leaving the both of them alone because she knew they liked it.

Once in her room, Renee never came out, unsure what she’d find on the couch.

Nothing had happened, and Jean was starting to think nothing would ever.

“Your manager is going to fire you,” Jean gasps, breathless, as Neil pulls on Jean’s sleeves to strip him of his flannel.

“He can try,” Neil spits.

“Renee might walk in,” Jean tries.

“Stop finding excuses,” Neil pleads as he leaves a trail of hungry kisses on Jean’s bare sternum. His hands fumble with Jean’s belt and Jean can’t do much else than grip the edge of the counter behind him to keep his wobbly knees from giving up.

Jean chuckles and throws his head back at Neil nibbles at the skin on his shoulder.

“You hang around so much my manager is going to hire you,” Neil jokes as he strips himself of his own jeans. Jean mirrors the motion and then they’re in underwear in the backroom of Neil’s café, taking advantage of the lack of Thursday afternoon customers to get drunk on each other.

It’s hot enough outside for people to avoid coffee shops and head to the beach, and for a minute Jean thanks god that Neil lives on the West Coast.

“You drive me insane,” Neil smiles against his jaw, and before he can lick or bite, Jean grabs his head and kisses him senseless.

They fall back against the storage counter and Jean pulls on the waistband of Neil’s boxers to reverse their positions. He holds him there with steady hands then leaves Neil’s lips to hover the skin all the way down to his stomach. He rests warm kisses there, and Neil sighs in pleasure and anticipation.

Something loud falls in the corridor and both jump at the noise, but Jean’s hand pushes Neil back against the counter again, and he pulls on the waistband just enough to uncover Neil’s base.

“We should have gotten a lock,” Neil chuckles, cheeks red.

“Renee’s smart enough,” Jean looks up and smiles, the prettiest thing Neil has ever seen perhaps. It’s full of confidence and provocation, far from the sad little thing he used to know. As much as he loved it, seeing Jean bloom against him is something he doesn’t have the words for.

Neil traces circles with his fingertips, all along Jean’s neck, but his fingers lose focus and still against him when he feels Jean taking him whole. He closes his eyes and loses balance for a moment, but Jean’s fingers curl around his hip to hold him steady.

“Fuck,” Neil breathes out in almost a whisper. It feels like a secret, and though Jean’s heard it too many times before, he can’t seem to stop reacting to it—he whimpers against Neil’s inner thigh, hand around him, and when he looks up he doesn’t blink.

“I want you,” he says.

“You got me,” Neil sighs as Jean pulls on him.

“No, I really do.” He grabs the edge of the counter to get up and Neil’s hand lift to play with Jean’s strands as he does. His hand still around him, Jean stills, thoughtful. “I want you to do it now.”

“What if you don’t like it?”

“I’ll like it if it’s you,” Jean says, and their foreheads brush against each other’s. It’s so tender and familiar Jean almost forgets how hard he is.

He connects with reality again when he hears Neil’s soft gasp against his shoulder, all surprise and impatience. Jean puts his thumb across the head and Neil whines like he’s in pain.

“Okay, okay,” he whispers. “Okay.” It turns into a laugh, desperate, and Jean lets go of him to turn around. Neil’s lips instantly find the spine and Jean puts his own hand over the one Neil hooks around his waist, to lift it up to his mouth and kiss it gently.

Neil uses his free hand to pull Jean’s boxers down, and they stumble against the counter again, Jean bending over and Neil sprawling himself on his back.

They pray for Renee not to hear a thing and when they’re done, Neil thrusts one last desperate time, teeth hard against Jean’s shoulder. He doesn’t mind the pain, and they think they could do it every day.

It’s when they dress again that something happens, and suddenly Neil trips on his feet, walking backwards with a grin. It happens in a second, and Jean is observant enough to know those kinds of falls don’t end well, and the backroom’s floor is plain concrete. Neil’s body breaks with reality and he’s falling—

—and Jean grabs a handful of his shirt just in time. It doesn’t prevent Neil’s fall entirely, but he lands more softly and his head doesn’t hit the floor like it was meant to. Jean loses his balance and topples over him, but Neil catches him by the waist to make sure he doesn’t injure himself in the process.

Jean puts a hand to the floor to hold his own weight and the other on Neil’s cheek, thumb digging in without realizing it. Neil clutches the front of Jean’s flannel and they palp each other back to safety, out of breath.

“Are you okay?”

Neil’s in shock, because he knows. Nothing has happened since they’ve had the talk, and now every little danger feels lethal. This wouldn’t have been harmless, he feels it in his bones.

“Yeah,” he breathes out, and Jean brings him against him.

Neil’s arms wrap around him naturally and Jean sighs. “I’m going to see Kevin,” he decides.

This has lasted long enough—the dread, the anticipation, the sickening twist in his guts. He can’t spend the rest of his days wondering if Neil would be able to get up after a fall like that.

“He told me he’s found someone else.”

“From his dreams?” Neil asks, and they forget all about the coffee shop and Renee in the other room.

“Someone like us,” Jean corrects, pensive.

Neil doesn’t say anything at first. “You should go,” he settles on eventually.

“Are you sure?” Jean says, and strokes Neil’s back affectionately.

“Yeah. If you don’t go, you’ll never know.” Know what, he isn’t sure, but he’s certain this trip will bring something important. If anything, the knowledge he’s not alone—the knowledge this is no curse.

That he isn’t death.

That he doesn’t bring death, either.

That he can save someone—and himself as he does.

“I don’t want to leave you alone,” Jean admits. They haven’t left each other’s side from than a few hours since he’s come back, and the loneliest they have been was Jean spending afternoons napping back to health in Neil’s comfortable bed while he worked his shifts.

“I can handle myself,” Neil reassures, even though he knows, somehow, he’s only alive because Jean was there. He’s not sure how many times Jean’s presence has saved him already, but this feels like more than twice. “I know how to fight,” he says. Days ago Neil had told him about his abusive father, and how he’d finally learned self-defense to make sure he wouldn’t be hit or hurt again, how it’d saved him through high school, and how enjoyable it was to be able to care for yourself. He’d told him, too, that Renee was a black belt in martial arts, and had mastered the questionable art of knife throwing when she was a teenager. “There’s Renee with me anyway,” he adds because nothing is ever going to be unnecessary when it comes to this kind of safety.  The more reassured Jean is, the better both will feel, and they know it.

“Okay,” he concedes in a sigh. “But you’ll call me every evening to tell me you’re fine.”

“I will,” Neil promises, and kisses his shoulder before getting up.

 

“What’s his name?” Jean asks, hands in his pockets. There he looks dry and distant, far from the familiar tenderness he loses himself in when Neil is close. He looks cold, if anything, and Kevin doesn’t look any warmer.

“David,” he says as he checks his phone for messages. The elevator rings another level, and Jean stares at the ever-growing number on the dashboard. “David Wymack, something along those lines.” He shrugs.

“And how old is he?”

“Oh,” Kevin says as he looks up. “Old enough to be my father that’s for sure.”

Jean snorts and the doors open. “Where did he tell you to meet him already?”

“Room 788,” Kevin replies. “He’s about to leave for his flight so he can’t meet us anywhere else. We have about twenty minutes.”

It had always been a busy city, and Jean wouldn’t have expected anything else.

“Behave,” Kevin glances at him when they stop by the door 788. Jean frowns, bitter, but Kevin knocks before he could snap anything back.

Then the door opens and a tall man appears in the doorframe, shirt sleeves rolled up to his elbows and skin slightly too dark to be summer tan.

“You must be Kevin,” he growls, visibly preoccupied, and offers a hand to both. They shake it one after the other, and Wymack steps aside to let them in.

The room is as spacious and expensive as could get, and Jean lingers on every detail, eye always sensitive to beautiful things. Meanwhile Kevin starts up the conversation, and he listens without a word, nonchalant.

“How long have you been like this?”

“A month or two, not much longer,” Wymack frowns as he tries to remember.

“What happened?” Jean unexpectedly asks, standing before the large window and gazing at the city underneath them.

Both turn to look at him, but Jean doesn’t turn back.

“Heart attack,” he simply says.

Kevin looks around, and doesn’t need to ask why. It’s easy to tell Wymack is obsessed by his work, whatever it is, and stress has never been good for anyone, much less someone with heart problems.

“What’s your story?” he asks Kevin.

Kevin examines the rest of Wymack’s room: a neat closet, an organized desk with stacks of papers, files, and a shiny laptop. There’s a tiny bottle of whiskey from his room buffet, and Kevin stares at it for a second.

“Ethylic coma,” he let out, cold and detached. “Then my heart stopped.”

They stare at each other, acknowledging their similar cases and nodding respectfully. Then Wymack points at Jean. “What about you?”

Jean peeps above his shoulder but only for a second. “Car accident. Reckless youth.”

Wymack doesn’t ask much more than this. It’s all there is to say about the matter anyway. They all died—they all came back.

“Did you find anything?” Kevin asks when silence settles a little too heavy. Jean isn’t going to ask, he knows, and he stares at his back to make him know he’s done with his attitude. He wonders what Neil must be like to earn Jean’s best side but doesn’t ask.

“I think I did,” he shrugs. “I found three people already.”

Jean’s attention shows at the reply, and he meets Kevin’s gaze in the reflection of the large window. It doesn’t last long.

“What happened to them?”

“One of them died,” he says grimly. “I couldn’t help it.”

“What about the two others?”

“A five year old girl and a man my age. Both are fine now.”

“How can you tell?” Jean abruptly interrupts, and it’s so skeptical it reeks aggression.

“They’d be dead by now,” Wymack only says as he turns to him. Kevin asks something but Wymack doesn’t answer, attention full on Jean for the moment. “You found one,” he deduces.

Jean meets his gaze in the reflection, this time, but doesn’t say anything, and brings his interest back to the skyscrapers in front of him.

Wymack nods to himself. “Yeah, you did.” He sighs deeply. “The little girl has her whole life to live now. I dreamed about her again. She had kids.” Jean doesn’t budge, so he goes on. “And the man, well… he got a heart attack as well.”

“I thought you said they were fine,” Jean snaps, sharp and defensive.

“They are. He came back.”

Jean turns. “Does that mean he’s like us now?”

Wymack shakes his head. “He didn’t stay long enough.” He glances at Kevin, then back at Jean. “Whatever this thing is, it happens when we linger on the other side a little too long.” He shakes his head again. “I don’t want to become a lab rat.”

What he’s implying is pretty clear. “If nobody does, then we won’t able to know how it works.”

Wymack shrugs. “It’s fine with me. At this rate, I don’t have much longer to live. I’ll keep the rest of it searching for people and save as many as I can. I’m no use if they dissect me.”

“Then wh—” Kevin starts to ask, but Jean’s phone rings and startles him.

He pulls it out of his suit pocket and checks the caller. Surprisingly, it’s Renee.

“Hello?” he says after sliding the screen to unlock it.

“Jean?” Renee asks, and she sounds breathless, like she didn’t quite expect Jean to pick up—or perhaps hoped he wouldn’t.

“Yes,” he says. That’s his number after all.

“Something happened,” she says, and he thinks he can hear her usually soft voice shake on the end of the line. Before he can ask what, she goes on, “with Neil.”

Jean looks at Kevin, face livid, and Kevin doesn’t need to ask anything to know something’s wrong. Wymack watches closely, ready to help if needed, but there isn’t much the three of them can do from that distance.

Jean almost drops the phone, and pressed a hand to his mouth in horror. He doesn’t want to hear what Renee has to say.

“There are things I need to tell you, but it better be face to face,” she says. He thinks that might be a good sign; after all, she wouldn’t be as heartless as to keep the mystery for that long if Neil was already dead.

What she says next makes him breathe again, “he’s in a coma right now, but—” and Jean chokes on relief, sliding against the window as he coughs.

Kevin rushes to him and kneels by his side, face twisted in worry, but Wymack only stays still with far-off curiosity. He looks sad, and tired, like he’s seen these things too many times.

“But I think you should come,” Renee adds. He can tell she’s nodding to herself.

“Of course I am,” he says, bitter with the evidence. It’s not like he would ever stay there if something happened to Neil, and she’s in the best position to know that. “I’m coming,” he says, and waits for Renee to end the call. She doesn’t.

“Jean,” she says, and she chokes on a little sob. He figures this is mostly nerves, and tries to ignore his own teary eyes, or how tight his chest feels from the horror he’s lived for a short second. There’s still hope. “He needs you,” she says, and ends the call before Jean can add anything.

He waits until the beep is obvious, then checks the screen and looks up at Kevin.

“What happened?” he rushes, panicked.

“It’s Neil,” he says, voice derailing a little as he does.

Kevin stares at him hard and, for a moment, Jean thinks he’s going to get angry again. Tell him that was supposed to happen, tell him there was no other way and that Jean was stupid. But Wymack’s story changed everything, and he was past denying Jean would ever be better off without Neil.

He looks at Wymack. “We must go.”

Jean’s face drops with surprise and though he stares at Kevin, Kevin doesn’t stare back. He knows he’s too prideful to acknowledge what he just did.

“I understand,” Wymack says, then scribbles something over a piece of paper and waits for Jean to get up before handing it to him. “This is for you. I have the feeling you might need it sometime.”

Jean looks at the number hastily written, and puts it back to safety in his suit pocket. “Thank you,” he says, and he means it.

“Don’t,” Wymack replies. “Now go, the both of you,” and he points at the door, fainting rudeness to get them moving. “I still have my suitcase to pack and I’m not missing my flight because of you.”

Kevin lingers behind Jean for a minute, and they nod, thank you silently said. Jean’s not sure what way—both, perhaps. They’re meeting again for sure.

He can’t tell how quickly he ran to the elevator, and then to his car, but time ceases to matter for a moment. He parts with Kevin as quickly as he can, and then he’s on the road, driving as fast as he can, ignoring red lights and passing over every car that’s not moving quick enough.

By the time he’s at the hospital, it’s night time, and he hopes he can still visit—but in the corridor of the room he’s been directed at, he finds Renee, and she gets up from her seat in instant relief.

The smile she gives is familiar, and he loses himself in it for a second. “Renee.”

She doesn’t wait for approval and wraps strong, lean arms around him. Jean puts a hand to her short hair and allows her to stay there for a privileged moment, but then he starts getting worried.

“He told me, you know.” Jean frowns as they part. “Long ago, he told me.”

Jean peeps at the door, swallows dry—needing to see him.

“I know what happened to you. He was trying to tell me and, I think he backpedaled out of it because he was scared I wouldn’t take him seriously. That he thought I would consider you crazy.”

Jean looks at her. She’s not blinking, and somehow, his chest tightens before she evens says it.

“He shouldn’t have feared. And I should have told him, too.”

Jean closes his eyes. “You too.”

“Yeah,” Renee lets out. It sounds like long, profound sigh, like she’s been holding it in for too long and couldn’t voice the relief of letting go of her secret. “I got into a knife fight years ago. They brought me back shy of four minutes.”

Jean looks at the ceiling, licking his lips in half-disbelief. He should have known.

He should have known.

“They called me a miracle.”

Jean brings a palm to his mouth and chokes back a sob—he’s not sure why, because Neil’s right there, breathing in the next room, but it feels like too much to keep in. He’s overwhelmed, and tired again, like leaving Neil has broken him again. He decides to never leave without him again.

“I found him by accident at first. Then he offered me a job because his manager needed someone else to hold the café and… I don’t think he really expected me to say yes. And I didn’t.”

“You dreamed of him,” Jean deduced.

“I did. So I came back and I asked if the job offer still held. I knew I had to… I knew I had to watch over him. Someone had to do that.” She paused, looked at her palms with a nostalgic smile. “I didn’t mind doing that.”

He didn’t quite expect her to chuckle, not with the way her eyes looked watery as well, but she did.

“But look at him now. He’s got you. And you saved him, you really did—not even in the way you think. He’s happy now. He’s more himself when you’re around.”

Jean looks at her, and they both hold back their tears for as long as they could, but then Jean’s face twists and she closes the distance again, resting her face against his chest. He holds her close, and they shake with relieved sobs, knowing they’re not alone in this hell anymore.

Knowing they understand.

“Thank you,” he says, but she parts and wipes her tears with a smile.

“Don’t worry,” she shakes her head. “Go see him. He needs you more than me.”

He rushes to the door but, before he can pull on the handle, she calls his name. “You know, I didn’t dream that.”

He turns, confused.

“His accident. I didn’t dream it.”

Jean’s eyes open wider with the understanding of Renee’s words. Neil will be fine.

Neil will be fine.

 

Neil’s hand is oddly cold, but he holds it anyway. The nurse changing his bandages turns to him when she feels his gaze weighing in her back.

“Nobody told you what happened, did they?”

Jean shakes his head and looks away. “I wasn’t sure I’d be able to handle it.”

“Are you, now?” she asks, surprisingly soft.

He nods, almost timidly so. He holds Neil’s hand a little tighter and hopes he can feel it in his forlorn sleep.

“Your friend,” she says, “with the cross necklace,” and she gestures to her own to accompany her words. “He stole her car. He went over the speed limit on a dangerous road and the car rolled over a few times.”

Jean swallows. It’s as hard as he thinks it was going to be, but—

“Did he have problems?” the nurse asks, frown serious and a little too saddened. It almost looks like pity, and Jean’s heart clenches at it. This isn’t something he’d expected to see, and it’s certainly not something good.

“What?” he says, taken by surprise.

“Your friend,” she says. “He was alone on that road.” She hesitates for a moment, uneasy. “I know this is hard to hear but, did he try to kill himself?”

Jean’s jaw drops and his eyes flicker to Neil’s damaged face. He’s got scars all over, cuts still open—and bandages everywhere trying to piece his body back together. He didn’t break much more than a few bones on his left arm, but he looks dead.

He wishes he would wake up now.

He wishes he would tell him why he’d done that.

“Is he g—” Jean starts to ask, but then something awfully loud echoes around him and he gets up, Neil’s hand still in his.

The nurse’s face goes livid and she rushes to the wall to press a red button, shouting at people in the corridor she needs a reanimation team, and Jean thinks he’s never heard more horrific words than this.

The words play in his head again and again, unstoppable—he was alone on that road, he was alone on that road, he was—

Kill himself—kill himself—

“Get out!” the nurse yells, and suddenly two arms are grabbing him and pulling him backwards. He stumbles and his hand drops Neil’s, and he’s too far, too far to take it back. He screams at the nurses to let him go, but a man hooks an arm around him and forces him back to let the reanimation team flow in.

Renee stands in shock in the open doorframe, and he can only watch Neil’s unmoving body as people animatedly work around him, waiting for a heartbeat rhythm, then yelling at the doctor to go on as he leans in and puts the defibrillator on his bare chest. His body doesn’t shake like it does in the movies, but the sound of it is terrible and Jean stops moving.

He can’t tell how much time has passed when it happens, but he knows he doesn’t have much left when he remembers—he hasn’t dreamed it, either.

It’s not Neil’s hour.

Neil is not supposed to die.

He waits for the nurses and doctors to bring him back, again and again, but they don’t see anything on the screen and Jean starts to panic. He waits again, but nothing happens.

Why aren’t they bringing him back?

And then, everything clicks.

You saved him, Renee’s voice replays in the back of his head.

He thinks about the time he’s told him about the sweater and the crossroad, the time he’s grabbed his shirt before his head could smash against the concrete and crack his skull open.

He thinks about all the times he probably unconsciously avoided Neil’s death by staying at his sides.

If someone is supposed to save him, it’s him—it’s him and they can’t—

“Stop!” he yells, furiously, as he tries to get out of the man’s grip, but he fights back and tries to bring him to the corridor. He’s seen too much already. “Let me go!”

He tries to remember how long they have been trying to reanimate Neil, and then he recalls the conversation in Wymack’s room. Didn’t stay long enough, he’d said.

Didn’t stay long enough—

—he needs—

But then Renee appears out of nowhere and gently kicks the back of the man’s knees, efficiently enough for the nurse to lose his balance and let Jean go—and he runs to Neil’s body, a rush of adrenaline shutting his brain down.

They’re all starting to back off in hopelessness when he stumbles to the bed, thinking Neil is gone for good—and the little woman puts the palettes down—

And Jean’s tight fist smashes hard against Neil’s chest.

It takes a few seconds—an eternity, and long enough for the nurse to grab his arms again, but this time he doesn’t fight—and they all watch in awe as Neil’s rhythm comes back on the screen. He chokes back to awakening, and a nurse rushes to pull the tube out of his throat.

He can’t move, and Jean probably injured him more than he already was—but his eyes open with great effort and the machines beep again, going back to normal.

Jean turns to catch a glimpse of Renee, held by the shoulders by two security guards. They share a stunned glance, and they smile, oh, they smile.

He doesn’t fight when another security guard drags him out of the room, and they stumble to the closest exit in euphoric chuckles.

Breathless, they lean over the borders and Jean lights a cigarette.

He takes a drag, then offers it to Renee. She hesitates for a moment, then takes it.

“Thank you,” she says.

Jean closes his eyes as he breathes in Renee’s smoke. “No, thank you.”

She knows what he’s talking about and smiles, handing the cigarette back.

“How long do you think it’ll take for us to be allowed back there?”

Jean shrugs, amused. “I don’t care. If they don’t let us in, I’ll punch them myself.” He turns to Renee, and they grin. “That was beautiful.”

“I’ve got years of practice,” she shrugs in her turn.

“Remind me not to ever cross you,” Jean jokes, and though he looks disinterested, Renee can tell he’s happy. “Do you think he’s going to be okay?”

“With you at his sides?” Renee says, and he realizes she’s not joking. “Yeah. He is.”

“But here—”

“Yeah,” she cuts off, softly. She waits a moment before adding, “they told you didn’t they?”

Jean offers her his cigarette again and exhales. He watches at the cloud of smoke dissolves into the night, then nods.

“He wasn’t trying to kill himself,” Renee reassures.

Jean looks at her, pensive. “He was trying to save himself.”

Renee calmly nods.

Silence settles as they look at each other, and—

“What an idiot,” Jean settles on as he looks at the parking lot before them.

He hears Renee’s soft chuckle, and they share the cigarette as they ride out the high of their adrenaline. It’s three a.m. when someone comes in the corridor they’re sitting in to tell them Neil is awake.

Jean gets up in the same breath and Renee follows, but then shakes her head and sits back down. “Go,” she says. Jean looks about to protest, but she insists. “I bet he wants to get you alone. I’ll wait by the door, just let me in when you’re done.”

He thanks her with a soft, well-earned smile and he follows the nurse to Neil’s room.

She opens the door for him then closes it behind him, and he’s left alone with Neil’s broken body. The moment he spots Jean by the door his face lights up, and though he grimaces instantly from all the cuts he’s opening as he smiles, he looks so amused that Jean thinks it’s terribly out of place.

“I hate you,” he says, and stops by the bed, hands in his slacks’ pockets.

Neil weakly chuckles, and Jean shakes his head. Softly, at first, then so violently he has to bring a hand to his mouth and Neil’s smile disappears.

“Hey,” he tries, voice hoarse, “hey don’t—” and raises a meek hand to grab his arm. Jean lets him and he falls on the edge of the bed, and Neil takes advantage of the proximity to grab his hand and bring it to his mouth. He kisses it, gently, and Jean closes his eyes.

“I’m moving in tonight,” Jean says as he looks at the floor. He can feel Neil’s snort against his knuckles, where he holds them against his mouth still. Neil kisses them again.

“You’re my guardian angel,” Neil says, and Jean gives him all his attention.

Silence follows, uncertain.

“Then why did you—” he tries, but the sight of Neil rolling over in a car, helpless, is almost too much to handle.

“Hey,” Neil calls again, and pulls on his hand a little. Jean sits a bit closer and frowns, giving him a stern, discontented look. “I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have.”

“No,” he says, then swallows. “No you did good.”

Neil’s eyes light up in curiosity, and, perhaps, relief.

“I met the guy Kevin found. He’s saved two of the three he met. Two, Neil.” Jean’s smile is almost crazy, and it shakes a little like he can’t quite believe Wymack managed to do that. “And one of them died, but they managed to bring him back.”

“What does that mean?”

Jean’s brows flickered up, weak with pure relief. “This means you’re safe now.” This time, it’s him who brings his own hand back and kisses Neil’s knuckles. Neil smiles, and it’s the prettiest thing he’s ever seen. “I don’t think you stayed there long enough to…” he looks around, confused, “change.”

“What if I did?” Neil asks, because it needs to be asked.

“Then we’ll protect each other.”

 

It’s three months later when Neil wakes up in sweat, startling Jean as he does.

“Shit,” he breathes out, and brings a hand to his bare torso where his heart races.

“Are you okay?” Jean rushes as he sits upright, and brings a hand to Neil’s hair to stroke his curls.

Neil turns to him, stunned. He’s not sure how he feels, but his eyes are wide with understanding. “It’s the little boy.”

Jean frowns, then silence stretches and his traits relax as he takes it in. Then, out of nowhere, Neil smiles.

“It’s the little boy,” he repeats, and Jean brings him closer to him.

Jean stares at the open door, then at the cardboard boxes Renee is supposed to come pick up today. She moved out a week ago, but there are still things she needs to get. Of course they’d celebrated by fucking in every room, but this night, they don’t feel like doing anything.

They don’t feel like going back to sleep either.

“Do you want us to go find him?” Jean asks, and realizes he hasn’t had a dream in a long time.

Neil settles back on top of him, head resting on Jean’s chest. “No need,” he smiles, peaceful. “He’s going to be fine.”

He turns his head just enough for their gaze to meet and then, Jean understands what little boy he’s talking about. It’s the one Jean had dreamed of months ago, the one he’d only found two weeks earlier. Finding him had been enough to change the course of things, as Wymack had proved, but Neil was something else.

He was something entirely different.

“What do you mean?”

Neil smiled, warm. “It was just a dream.”

Jean punches his shoulder and Neil laughs softly. “How do you feel about Texas though?”

“Texas?” Jean echoes, confused. “Why?”

“I have the feeling you might want to go there,” he says, and turns to grin.

Jean stares, dumbfounded. “What are you saying?”

“I’m saying you might find someone interesting there,” Neil answers. “She’s fifteen. Brilliant,” he adds. “I think she’d like to know what she can do.”

Jean stares a little longer, face cold.

“Are you—” he puts a hand to his mouth, looks away, blaming it on the exhaustion of being pulled out of his sleep. “Did you find one?”

Neil nods and then a knowing smile curves the corners of his lips. He knows exactly what he’s dreamed of, Jean can tell, because he feels the need to punch his shoulder again.

“But you…” Jean starts, and never finishes. “I made sure you didn’t stay there long enough. I didn’t want you to go through this.”

“And I didn’t.” Neil slides a hand up his torso and up to his neck, then his cheek, caressing with such tenderness Jean feels the need to pull him down for a kiss. “Nobody’s going to die,” he says, “not anytime soon.”

Jean sits upright and grabs Neil’s face, eyes beaming with something he can’t pinpoint. “You,” he breathes out.

“Don’t you dare neglect me when you create your squad of undead psychics,” Neil says before leaning in and kissing Jean deep.

Then he pulls out and crawls out of bed like nothing happened, and Jean stares in shock.

“Hey, you know what,” Neil says in the doorframe, and turns around, face serious. “Call Kevin and tell him to go find her, because we’re not going anywhere today. I’ll text him the address later. You have a shift at the café tomorrow morning. If I can’t fuck you all night, I’ll fuck you all afternoon.”

He disappears into the kitchen and all he can hear is this:

“Are you hungry?”

And, surprisingly, in a chuckle, Jean lets out, “yes.”


End file.
